While exercise is good, it's worth noting that in those lines of work your body wears its out after decades of doing it, and injury rates are fairly high.

When I lived in Cambodia I saw a lot of Abercrombie-model looking guys in their 50s. They were farmers, I think. I’m currently in Italy living with a farmer in her 60s who’s in great shape. The other day she dropped cold into a front split. I don’t want to say farm work is a panacea — I know it depends on what you’re doing and how you do it — but my own experience plus a book by Esther Gokhale have convinced me that healthy work builds your body and doesn’t tear it down.

I do think there’s a lot of physical labor that isn’t healthy. And there’s also labor that’s kind of on the line, like heavy lifting — if done properly it’s safe, improperly and it can cause damage.

Sitting in an office chair for decades doesn't cause great health outcomes either.

But it's the norm in our class, so we accept it as natural.

health outcomes are relative, though.

office work will not cut your working life short with something fatal or totally unable to work.

Probably the most common pre-industrial job was farmer, which is super repetitive. Imagine a task like tilling with a hoe, which would be a very repetitive and strong swinging motion.

It’s repetitive in the sense that one does the same thing many times but not in the sense that one does the same thing day in day out as there are many things to be done and they vary throughout the year.

It’s also a lot more complicated, at least now. While some tasks are repetitive, the activities rotate throughout the year. But it’s even more than that. I worked for a farmer before joining the Navy, and talking with him was interesting. Incredibly intelligent guy who I believe could have went on to do anything in world if he wanted to. Why did he settle with farming? It was his family farm, he ran his own business, but the answer that struct me even more was this, he said, “I get to wear a lot of hats. I am an engineer, those tobacco barns, I designed them. I am a mechanic, my old IH tractor breaks, I fix it. I am a business man because I make deals with local restaurants to sell my produce. I am a scientist, I work with the state university on soil studies and have a plot dedicated to running experiments with the university.” He listed some more but I can’t remember them all. The point is, for him, being a farmer let him be everything he wanted to be.

Right, you're likely never going to hoe so many days in a row that you develop RSI.

The guy who did develop it is likely the guy who invented the plow

Hoeing is a great full body workout. You go pretty fast if you swing from your hips without moving your arms too much, and your joints don’t feel strained either. I have seen people swing the hoe like an axe but I suspect this is not the most sustainable technique.

Is your farming experience strictly from Harvest Moon?

Yeah, it was great. Until I fucked both of my knees and my back, and have been in pain ever since. It affected me mentally, as well lol.

No one helped me, no one even thanked me.

Take the mental work. At least you can always exercise enough to be spared them physical injuries.

What happened?